How to format your references using the BMC Pharmacology and Toxicology citation style

This is a short guide how to format citations and the bibliography in a manuscript for BMC Pharmacology and Toxicology. For a complete guide how to prepare your manuscript refer to the journal's instructions to authors.

Using reference management software

Typically you don't format your citations and bibliography by hand. The easiest way is to use a reference manager:

Paperpile	The citation style is built in and you can choose it in Settings > Citation Style or Paperpile > Citation Style in Google Docs.
EndNote	Find the style here: output styles overview
Mendeley, Zotero, Papers, and others	The style is either built in or you can download a CSL file that is supported by most reference managers.
BibTeX	BibTeX styles are usually part of a LaTeX template. Check the instructions to authors if the publisher offers a LaTeX template for this journal.

Journal articles

Those examples are references to articles in scholarly journals and how they are supposed to appear in your bibliography.

Not all journals organize their published articles in volumes and issues, so these fields are optional. Some electronic journals do not provide a page range, but instead list an article identifier. In a case like this it's safe to use the article identifier instead of the page range.

A journal article with 1 author

1. Stocker R. Marine microbes see a sea of gradients. Science. 2012;338:628–33.

A journal article with 2 authors

1. Paterson I, Anderson EA. Chemistry. The renaissance of natural products as drug candidates. Science. 2005;310:451–3.

A journal article with 3 authors

1. Grirrane A, Corma A, García H. Gold-catalyzed synthesis of aromatic azo compounds from anilines and nitroaromatics. Science. 2008;322:1661–4.

A journal article with 7 or more authors

1. Lawrence A, Clark L, Labuzetta JN, Sahakian B, Vyakarnum S. The innovative brain. Nature. 2008;456:168–9.

Books and book chapters

Here are examples of references for authored and edited books as well as book chapters.

An authored book

1. Paret D. Flexray and its Applications. Chichester, UK: John Wiley & Sons, Ltd; 2012.

An edited book

1. Fong Y, Giulianotti PC, Lewis J, Groot Koerkamp B, Reiner T, editors. Imaging and Visualization in The Modern Operating Room: A Comprehensive Guide for Physicians. New York, NY: Springer; 2015.

A chapter in an edited book

1. Castillo-Ramírez S, Feil EJ. Covering All the Bases: The Promise of Genome-Wide Sequence Data for Large Population Samples of Bacteria. In: Trueba G, Montúfar C, editors. Evolution from the Galapagos: Two Centuries after Darwin. New York, NY: Springer; 2013. p. 41–62.

Web sites

Sometimes references to web sites should appear directly in the text rather than in the bibliography. Refer to the Instructions to authors for BMC Pharmacology and Toxicology.

Blog post

1. Taub B. Excessive Drinking Could Increase Your Chance Of Asthma. IFLScience. 2016. https://www.iflscience.com/health-and-medicine/excessive-drinking-could-increase-your-chances-asthma/. Accessed 30 Oct 2018.

Reports

This example shows the general structure used for government reports, technical reports, and scientific reports. If you can't locate the report number then it might be better to cite the report as a book. For reports it is usually not individual people that are credited as authors, but a governmental department or agency like "U. S. Food and Drug Administration" or "National Cancer Institute".

Government report

1. Government Accountability Office. Joint Strike Fighter Acquisition: Development Schedule Should Be Changed to Reduce Risks. Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office; 2000.

Theses and dissertations

Theses including Ph.D. dissertations, Master's theses or Bachelor theses follow the basic format outlined below.

Doctoral dissertation

1. Schellhous WT. Factors and Interactions Contributing to the Risk of Fire following Earthquake for Urban Southern California. Doctoral dissertation. California State University, Long Beach; 2017.

News paper articles

Unlike scholarly journals, news papers do not usually have a volume and issue number. Instead, the full date and page number is required for a correct reference.

New York Times article

1. Kinsley M. Paid Leave Counts as Progress. New York Times. 2017;:SR3.

In-text citations

References should be cited in the text by sequential numbers in square brackets:

This sentence cites one reference [1].
This sentence cites two references [1, 2].
This sentence cites four references [1–4].

About the journal

Full journal title	BMC Pharmacology and Toxicology
Abbreviation	BMC Pharmacol. Toxicol.
ISSN (online)	2050-6511
Scope